Jim Commentucci / The Post-StandardJordan-Elbridge school board member Mary Alley attends a Nov. 3 school board meeting at Jordan-Elbridge High School.

Jordan, NY - The Jordan-Elbridge school board is looking into how much it would cost to have security at their meetings after an intense meeting tonight that began with a resident joking about the Florida school board shooting.

Several board members said they also want to begin audio recording meetings.

"I was going to come down here and spray paint a big red V on the wall like the guy on the news, but I didn’t think other people would appreciate my humor," Jordan resident Dana Anthonson said referring to the Florida gunman who opened fire at school board members last week in Panama City.

Jordan-Elbridge school board president Mary Alley immediately interrupted Anthonson.
"That’s not even funny," she said. "That’s offensive. Mr. Anthonson, you can yield the floor."

Anthonson continued speaking, but was continuously interrupted by school board members asking him to stop talking, sit down and leave.

“OK, let’s try a little audience participation here,” he said. “How many of the folks here would like to see all these recent bad decisions set aside and everything go back to where it was a few months ago before the big personnel shakeup? If you’d like to see this whole mess end, right now applaud.”

Several people in the audience stood up and clapped.

“OK. Now applaud if you want to continue with the expensive and time-consuming mess that’s been making the papers for the past few months?” Anthonson said. “Anyone? I rest my case. It’s a case of anvils and it’s resting right on top of the board.”

Alley said Anthonson is not the first person to threaten the Jordan-Elbridge school board. After the Florida school board shooting, someone posted an anonymous comment on syracuse.com saying "this oughta be a wake up call for the Jordan-Elbridge school board," Alley recalled.

Alley said there also were other threatening comments made to both board members and their family members. All of the threatening comments on the syracuse.com story were removed and The Post-Standard web team wrote that "some comments have been removed from this story because they violate our community rules. Encouraging others to break the law and threatening people are violations of our user agreement."

"It’s just very personal. All of this is very personal," Alley said. "I just think we as a community need to work through these things and the antagonism and the blogs and the e-mails board members are receiving are not productive to us moving forward and healing and getting this district back on its feet."

John Stith / The Post-StandardLawrence Zacher was appointed interim superintendent for the Jordan-Elbridge school district on Nov. 5.

Interim Superintendent Larry Zacher said some board members feel intimidated.

"Sometimes I don’t think people know the half of it," Zacher said. "We have had board members who have felt they’re being stalked, that (two school board members’) mailboxes have been smashed and someone parked out in front of (a board member's) house at four o’clock in the morning. Maybe it’s a bowhunter looking for deer, but probably not."